


Numbers And Counting

by Spayne



Series: Words and Numbers [1]
Category: Killing Eve (TV 2018)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-20
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:14:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24829675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spayne/pseuds/Spayne
Summary: A post season three story where Villanelle is fine. She is coping. Mostly.
Relationships: Eve Polastri/Villanelle | Oksana Astankova
Series: Words and Numbers [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1799506
Comments: 23
Kudos: 197





	Numbers And Counting

**Author's Note:**

> Just a word of warning, this is a story about anxiety and panic attacks. If that’s you and it’s a trigger you may want to skip it. 
> 
> I get that everyone’s experience of these issues varies but if there’s anything that you think is terribly wrong do let me know.

Sometimes they creep up on you and sometimes they don’t.

This has been flickering at the edge of your consciousness for most of the day. Since you drove over a fallen branch as you drove home from the lake together, except all of a sudden it wasn’t a branch at all, it was the familiar crunch of bone. 

Nothing happened at the time. She said something about checking the trees above the house for any branches which look bad before the autumn comes. You murmured an acknowledgment but thought of bones shattering beneath car wheels, beneath your fingers, beneath the flat of a shovel. It’s happened in a lot of different ways after all. Some more satisfying than others admittedly.

You carried on as normal for the evening, and if the clatter of cutlery in the sink was too jarring and the gentle rub of her fingers on the back of your neck too raw, you said nothing. But it was there, hovering around you, so you knew this would come eventually.

You sit with your back pressed firmly to the weatherboarding of the house. Your fingers find the familiar groove between the wall and the decking, they curl into it and you go through the normal routine.

You’re safe. She is safe. You are safe. She is safe. 

This works sometimes. It’s enough sometimes. The thoughts loop through your mind to calm the pressure at the edges of everything. Sometimes it just takes minutes of this and it’s fine. You can come back to her and smile and joke and argue and fuck and watch movies and everything else you barely let yourself dream that you’d have with her one day.

But sometimes it doesn’t. 

Sometimes those thoughts are swamped beneath everything that you’ve seen and done. Everything and all of it rushing through your brain so there is no space to fit in the usual mantra. 

It’s funny really that when you killed people your mind was always slow and steady. How apt that your punishment should be that you now can’t slow it down.

Tonight it’s one of those. 

You felt the tightness in your chest, in your throat and fingers. You shifted beneath the thigh slipped over yours, anchoring you to the bed. She didn’t wake. Thank god. You slipped outside and now here you are.

So you count. 

Safety in numbers. That’s an expression which rings true for you now. When you were younger it was language where you found your refuge. Now it’s numbers. You can’t twist numbers. You can’t rush them. Numbers don’t lead you back down into thoughts which keep your lungs from drawing in the right amount of oxygen. 

So you breathe. And you count. And if you start in time you can control it.

So now you count.

In for four. Out for eight. In for four. Out for eight. 

It started before she found you. The first time was a shock. An aberration you decided. After the next time you decided to read about it. You listened to podcasts. The next few times you tried some of the suggestions. Some worked, others didn’t.

But it’s been numbers that you found you could most comfortably rely on. 

Then she was there. Climbing out of the ridiculously small hire car, her shoes making that wonderful crisp sound on the bed of pine needles which coat the ground around the house.

You were annoyed at first. Her appearance here undoing your selfless act to set her free on the bridge. You surprised yourself by liking the idea of being a person who did good things for the one they loved, no matter the personal cost. But then her hand was on your cheek and her mouth pressed against yours. Meh. Being good is overrated.

You cooked her dinner. She watched. You washed. She dried. You watched a movie. She teased you for trying the arm across the back of the sofa move. She kissed you and led you upstairs to your own bed, now shared. You were nervous. She wasn’t. 

Then she stayed and for a while indulging in her was enough. She was the cure you decided. True love had fixed everything wrong with you. 

Reality bites pretty hard when you wake in the night soaked in sweat and shaking so hard that you can barely coordinate your limbs to get you outside and into the air your lungs so desperately crave. You lucked out that she’s a heavy sleeper.

She can’t know about this, not the extent of it at least. She’s looked at you in so many ways. Fear. Love. Amusement. Confusion. Anger. Hunger. But never pity. That you can’t accept. You won’t accept it. So you slip out in the night, or you walk in the day. You keep it outside and away from the perfect bubble of you, her, movies, dinner and the rest of it.

You’re trying to at least. But lately it’s been harder to hide. Her eyes catch on your fingers gripping too hard on the hilt of a fork. Her hand rubbing smooth circles into the tension in your back. Eyes which are so used to cataloging everything about you don’t let these details slide even if she doesn’t say anything.

You wonder how long you can keep it hidden. She’s always liked puzzles so it’s only a matter of time before she turns her mind to this.

Maybe you should leave. Or make her leave.

You breathe and you count.

In for four. Out for eight. In for four. Out for eight.

All of this for a fucking branch. 

You aren’t even sorry. Well. You aren’t sorry about most of them. You didn’t know them. Were they good? Or bad? Or just average? You didn’t care then. You don’t care now. That is all true. It just makes youmore and more angry that your mind and body are betraying you over a load of things in the past that you don’t even care about. You feel tears at the corners of your eyes and hate the tickle of them falling on your cheeks.

You need to get back to the numbers.

In for four. Out for eight. In for four. Out for eight.

It’s slowing. You keep your eyes closed until you can breathe without counting. You draw your knees up and rest your forehead on them. 

You hear it then. The stretch of the spring on the door from the house onto the decking. You feel her slide down the wall next to you. You hide your face against your knees. She doesn’t touch you and you are forever grateful. 

“Are you ok, baby?”

You open your eyes but keep your forehead tight to your knees. 

She’s borrowed your baby pink nail polish to use on her toes. 

Your chest seizes again but there is something freeing about your worst fears coming to fruition. You’ll never worry about them again at least. You wonder if this is how people felt in the moments before you killed them. You hope so.

You turn your face to meet her gaze and prepare for pity. What you find is love and concern and other things that you lack the words or experience to name.

“Are you ok?” She asks again

You can lie. You can always lie but you hesitate. You’ve had to do this with her what feels like a hundred times. You throw yourself unguarded at her feet and hope that she catches you. She’s let you down in the past. But things feel different now. You want to trust her with this and more than anything you want that trust to be justified. 

You wipe your eyes on the open palm of your hand. Your chest is tight again but you can’t stop your words from crawling out of your throat.

“No. I don’t think so.”

It’s a release of pressure that you’ve needed. You didn’t even know how much. Maybe it will be words that rescue you after all.  


She kisses your temple, guides your head onto her shoulder and takes your hand in hers. 

The tightness in your chest remains but it’s not the feeling you’ve come to dread.

She presses another kiss to the top of your head.

It is hope, you realise. The constriction in your chest is hope. 

Huh. It’s been a while.


End file.
